"Of all wretched women I am the most wretched, and amongst the unhappy I am unhappiest." -- Heloise (p. 129)
"Logic has made me hated by the world." -- Abelard (p. 170)
"If the whole world kept silent, the facts themselves would cry out." -- Heloise (p. 111)
I read selections from the letters of theologian Peter Abelard and Heloise, his former student, in high school, in my prized Portable Medieval Reader. Based on that, I've always thought of Abelard as a condescending jerk, and Heloise as someone who deserved better. Knowing that Abelard was assaulted, castrated, and more or less forced into a monastery, I have felt bad about that. However, my teenage judgment was only reinforced by reading their complete surviving correspondence, edited by Betty Radice in the Penguin Classics edition, along with Abelard's autobiographical essay about his "calamities." Heloise (d. 1164) comes across as an intelligent, passionate, forward-thinking woman at odds with her world and her time. Abelard (1079 - 1142) comes across as charismatic but irritatingly pompous, and it doesn't seem surprising that, while he finds people who admire him everywhere he goes, he alienates even more of them.
Both young and attractive, and turned on by each other's intellects, the two began an affair that ended as they could have expected. When she gets pregnant, they secretly marry, and Heloise hides in a convent from her disapproving uncle. She thinks neither of these responses is a good idea, telling him outright that "We shall both be destroyed" (74). She's correct, and after it goes disastrously wrong, she continues to do what he asks, and in a gesture of self-sacrifice becomes a nun. (Their son, christened Astrolabe, is little heard of again).
Years later, when his account of their affair and its aftermath is circulating, she writes to him with some reproach, giving her side of the story. She says that the memory of their pleasures "can never displease me" (133), and famously declares "the name of wife may seem more sacred or more binding, but sweeter for me will always be the word mistress, of, if you will permit, that of concubine or whore," (113) and "I would have had no hesitation, God knows, in following you or going ahead at your bidding to the flames of Hell" (117).
In return, he chastises her for "your old perpetual complaint" about having been pressured into religious life without a vocation (137), and bemoans that "I took my fill of my wretched pleasures in you, and this was the sum total of my love" (153). He also reminds her that "I often forced you to consent with threats and blows" (147). Eeee. After a few letters, seeming to realize she's not going to get anything better from him, Heloise settles down to writing him as a nun to her male superior in the church, and he replies with letters of instruction that she clearly doesn't really need. Since I had written "he's a pontificator!" in one of the margins, I was amused in the course of this when he quoted St. Gregory about the necessity for brevity when using words (189-190).
About these "Letters of Direction," I'd like to note that, in posing some theological questions, Heloise includes several quotes and makes points that Abelard later uses in full in his responses. Is he plagiarizing her to her face? I almost hoped his was making some kind of point by doing so, that she might have understood. For example, she talks about wine on p. 168 - 170, and his response on p. 231 - 234, he uses the exact same quotes she used, and makes mostly the same points, although with more words.
I also think Heloise was making a point about the absurdity of repudiation and self-mortification in her discussion of why or why not men and women in religious orders should refrain (or not) from wine and meat, and how ascetic they should be. She quotes one's of Paul's letters, 1 Timothy 4:1-5, which says: "The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron. They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer" (NIV). Since they're in religious orders that forbid them to marry, with restrictions on food, and since she has never been ashamed of her sexuality or its expression, this certainly has some subtext.
Overall, I can't believe I waited so long to read this, but it was very enlightening about the history of women's places in the world. It's a shame that someone like Heloise had such a limited scope within her time and society, but it's lucky for us that her powerful voice and subversive opinions -- crying out in the wilderness, in a sense -- were preserved
Abaelardus, Petrus, Heloise, and Betty Radice. The Letters of Abelard and Heloise. London: Penguin, 1974.
"Logic has made me hated by the world." -- Abelard (p. 170)
"If the whole world kept silent, the facts themselves would cry out." -- Heloise (p. 111)
I read selections from the letters of theologian Peter Abelard and Heloise, his former student, in high school, in my prized Portable Medieval Reader. Based on that, I've always thought of Abelard as a condescending jerk, and Heloise as someone who deserved better. Knowing that Abelard was assaulted, castrated, and more or less forced into a monastery, I have felt bad about that. However, my teenage judgment was only reinforced by reading their complete surviving correspondence, edited by Betty Radice in the Penguin Classics edition, along with Abelard's autobiographical essay about his "calamities." Heloise (d. 1164) comes across as an intelligent, passionate, forward-thinking woman at odds with her world and her time. Abelard (1079 - 1142) comes across as charismatic but irritatingly pompous, and it doesn't seem surprising that, while he finds people who admire him everywhere he goes, he alienates even more of them.
Both young and attractive, and turned on by each other's intellects, the two began an affair that ended as they could have expected. When she gets pregnant, they secretly marry, and Heloise hides in a convent from her disapproving uncle. She thinks neither of these responses is a good idea, telling him outright that "We shall both be destroyed" (74). She's correct, and after it goes disastrously wrong, she continues to do what he asks, and in a gesture of self-sacrifice becomes a nun. (Their son, christened Astrolabe, is little heard of again).
Years later, when his account of their affair and its aftermath is circulating, she writes to him with some reproach, giving her side of the story. She says that the memory of their pleasures "can never displease me" (133), and famously declares "the name of wife may seem more sacred or more binding, but sweeter for me will always be the word mistress, of, if you will permit, that of concubine or whore," (113) and "I would have had no hesitation, God knows, in following you or going ahead at your bidding to the flames of Hell" (117).
In return, he chastises her for "your old perpetual complaint" about having been pressured into religious life without a vocation (137), and bemoans that "I took my fill of my wretched pleasures in you, and this was the sum total of my love" (153). He also reminds her that "I often forced you to consent with threats and blows" (147). Eeee. After a few letters, seeming to realize she's not going to get anything better from him, Heloise settles down to writing him as a nun to her male superior in the church, and he replies with letters of instruction that she clearly doesn't really need. Since I had written "he's a pontificator!" in one of the margins, I was amused in the course of this when he quoted St. Gregory about the necessity for brevity when using words (189-190).
About these "Letters of Direction," I'd like to note that, in posing some theological questions, Heloise includes several quotes and makes points that Abelard later uses in full in his responses. Is he plagiarizing her to her face? I almost hoped his was making some kind of point by doing so, that she might have understood. For example, she talks about wine on p. 168 - 170, and his response on p. 231 - 234, he uses the exact same quotes she used, and makes mostly the same points, although with more words.
I also think Heloise was making a point about the absurdity of repudiation and self-mortification in her discussion of why or why not men and women in religious orders should refrain (or not) from wine and meat, and how ascetic they should be. She quotes one's of Paul's letters, 1 Timothy 4:1-5, which says: "The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron. They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer" (NIV). Since they're in religious orders that forbid them to marry, with restrictions on food, and since she has never been ashamed of her sexuality or its expression, this certainly has some subtext.
Overall, I can't believe I waited so long to read this, but it was very enlightening about the history of women's places in the world. It's a shame that someone like Heloise had such a limited scope within her time and society, but it's lucky for us that her powerful voice and subversive opinions -- crying out in the wilderness, in a sense -- were preserved
Abaelardus, Petrus, Heloise, and Betty Radice. The Letters of Abelard and Heloise. London: Penguin, 1974.
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